William James. "The Dilemma of Determinism"
(1) Either D (determinism) or not-D (indeterminism).
(2) There is no theoretical proof of either D or not-D.
[Whether D or not-D is intellectually undecidable.]
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Given the above, James finds that he (personally) confronts a dilemma regarding the acceptance of determinism and that he therefore can only accept indeterminism. His argument goes as follows:
(3) I must accept either D or not-D.
(4) If I accept D, then I must accept P (pessimism) or S (subjectivism)
(5) I cannot accept P.
(6) I cannot accept S.
Therefore:
(7) I must accept not-D.
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(8) All of us at one time or another make judgments of regret.
To regret that x is to judge that it would have been better had x not occurred.
(9) Either at least some of these judgments are correct or all of them are mistaken.
(10) If I accept that some judgments of regret are correct and I also accept determinism, then I must assume that it would have been better had there been another universe than the one we have. [Since there is no way out of the universe we have, accepting this is to accept P (pessimism.)]
(11) If I deny that any judgments of regret are true, then, if I also accept determinism, I must assume that our universe contains mistakes. [Though this may look, at first, as though it would allow us to hold an an optimistic view, since nothing in the universe which we regret could really be better than it is, the fact remains that the universe contains errors and therefore is not as good as a universe which contained no errors. This leads us back to P.]
(12) But I may deny that any judgments of regret are true and yet maintain that such judgments are themselves good for us to have if I accept S (subjectivism), i. e., believe that both what I regret and my having the regrets which I do serve the purpose of bringing about the only real good which there is, namely, the raising of my consciousness to a higher level of experience or knowledge.
(13) If I am a determinist and don't accept P, then I must accept S.
(14) If I accept S, then, since I believe that all that really counts is my experience or my knowledge, I must believe that my actions are neither morally right nor wrong and that what occurs in the world in neither good nor bad.
(15) But I cannot accept this consequence of S, for I will not give up all of my regrets nor my acceptance of the moral significance of what I do. ["There are some instinctive reactions which I, for one, will not tamper with."]
(16) Therefore, I must accept indeterminism and the pluralism which goes with it. [There is good and bad in the universe, but it is possible that through our action we may better it. This is meliorism.]
Douglas Browning
The University of Texas at Austin
Latest Update by DLH: April 11, 1999